* T. S. Eliot 写真出典:R. Clark's B. Russelll and His World, 1981.
「そうです,彼はいとも僕にヴィヨン(Francois Villon, 1431-1474: フランス中世の詩人)を想いおこさせます。」この言がとても良いと思ったので,もっと他に何か言ってくれればと,私はいつも,期待した。私の関心を引いたもう一人の学生は,デモスという名の男であった。彼はギリシア人であり,彼の父親は,宣教師たちによって改宗させられ,福音主義派の牧師になっていた。デモスは小アジア(注:黒海と地中海とのはさまれた西アジアの半島部で,トルコの大部分を占める。)で育てられ,小アジアのある小さな図書館の図書館長に出世していた。しかし,彼は,その図書館の蔵書を全て読んでしまうと,小アジアが彼に提供するものはもう何もない(小アジアから自分はもう何も得られない)と感じた。それゆえ彼は,ボストンまでの3等船室の1人分の旅客運賃の額に達するまで貯蓄をした。ボストンに到着すると彼は,最初レストランのウェイターの職を得た。それから彼は,ハーバード大学に入学した。彼は一生懸命勉強し,かなりの能力を身につけた。自然の成り行きで,彼はついに教授になった。彼の知性は,よく世間にみられる限界(usual limitations)から免れていなかった。彼は,1917年に,私にこう語っていた。自分は,ギリシア以外の交戦国が世界大戦に参戦するための論拠(理由)の真相を見抜くことができ,それらの議論はインチキであるとはっきり理解したが,(自分の母国)ギリシアの(参戦)理由(論拠)は全然別であり,ギリシアは純粋に道義上の問題から参戦しているのである,と。 T. S. Eliot に関する本 |
On the other hand, the students, especially the post-graduates, made a great impression upon me. The Harvard school of philosophy, until the three great losses mentioned above, had been the best in the world. I had stayed with William James at Harvard in 1896, and I had admired Royce's determination to introduce mathematical logic into the philosophical curriculum. Santayana, who had a great friendship for my brother, had been known to me since 1893, and I admired him as much as I disagreed with him. The tradition of these men was still strong. Ralph Barton Perry was doing his best to take their place, and was inspired with the full vigour of what was called 'the new realism'. He had married Berenson's sister. He already displayed, however, something of that New England moralism which caused him to be intellectually ruined by the first War. On one occasion he met, in my rooms, Rupert Brooke, of whom he had not then heard. Rupert was on his way back from the South Sea Islands, and discoursed at length about the decay of manhood in these regions produced by the cessation of cannibalism. Professor Perry was pained, for is not cannibalism a sin? I have no doubt that when Rupert died, Professor Perry joined in his apotheosis, and I do not suppose he ever realised that the flippant young man he had met in my rooms was identical with the golden-haired god who had given his life for his country. The students, however, as I said before, were admirable. I had a post-graduate class of twelve, who used to come to tea with me once a week. One of them was T. S. Eliot, who subsequently wrote a poem about it, called 'Mr Apollinax'. I did not know at the time that Eliot wrote poetry. He had, I think, already written 'A Portrait of a Lady', and 'Prufrock', but he did not see fit to mention the fact. He was extraordinarily silent, and only once made a remark which struck me. I was praising Heraclitus, and he observed: 'Yes, he always reminds me of Villon.' I thought this remark so good that I always wished he would make another. Another pupil who interested me was a man called Demos. He was a Greek whose father, having been converted by the missionaries, was an evangelical minister. Demos had been brought up in Asia Minor, and has risen to be librarian of some small library there, but when he had read all the books in that library he felt that Asia Minor had nothing further to offer him. He therefore saved up until he could atford a passage, steerage, to Boston. Having arrived there, he first got a job as a waiter in a restaurant, and then entered Harvard. He worked hard, and had considerable ability. In the course of nature he ultimately became a professor. His intellect was not free from the usual limitations. He explained to me in 1917 that while he could see through the case made by the other belligerents for their participation in the war, and perceived clearly that their argnments were humbug, the matter was quite different in the case of Greece, which was coming in on a genuine moral issue. |